Loud voices complain the Coke was too sweet. Coke brought out ‘New Coke’, less sweet. Millions voted with their feet and moved to the competition and Coke lost a ton of money. New Coke failed.
The “Too sweet” crowd shout the loudest, but they are the very small minority, and Coke learned this the hard way.
I make up 400ml water with 3 heaped scoops of Huel, and to that I add the equivalent in Stavia of 3 heaped teaspoons of sugar. I’ve given a dozen frinds of mine a sip to taste, and they all say “Yummy”. The minute you say the word Vanilla, what comes to mind is ice cream, milk shakes, custard and so on, all of which are very, very sweet. Tons of market research and double blind testing has taught them over the years that what people say and what people actually buy are not the same.
Research into what I’m saying is abundant, and the proof is in the sales of all sweet things. Fact is, they actually sell better when they are sweet like ice cream and milk shakes and fruit yoghurt.
Those who like things very sweet are probably too shy to come out loudly and say it, since it is nothing to be proud of, but those who only eat dark chocolate and unsweetened everything, loudly pronounce their preference as there is absolutely no shame in it for them, just a big proud approval, backed by a paradigm that we are naughty to want and like very sweet things. You’ll hear the ‘not sweet’ people a millions times more often and more loudly preciely because of society, and not because they are the majority.
Wouldn’t it be lovely if that practical solution you suggest actually worked commercially in the real world. It would be the perfect solution. If only it was possible to tell all shoppers buying ice cream, fruit yoghurt, milkshakes, puddings, you name it, that all these goods will now be sold ‘not sweet’ because you can always keep some sugar and some salt with you at all times, in your bag or pockets, and add more if you want it sweet, but you can’t take sugar or salt out, so for the sake of those who don’t want sweet or salt, all goods will be made with minimum or no sugar or salt from now on. Ha ha ha ha ha.
We all know what would happen. New companies would spring up everyhwere selling the very sweet and the noticably salty while all the very well meaning giants and juggernaught food companies, crashed into bankrupsy with their very good intentions sinking under the wave of new enterprise willing to cater for the mass market.
Besides, at the end of the day, you CAN but UU Huel. If people know that the vanilla is sweet to resemble ice cream and milk shake and pudding, then those who find ice cream and milk shakes too sweet will obviously also avoid the vanilla Huel, since vanilla Huel would be no different to normal shop bought vanilla produce. You can avoid Vanilla and stick to Unflavoured and Unsweetened and then add anything in any quantities, sugar or flavour or salt, yourself to your own preferred taste, but if tial samples of vanilla are sent out to new people, they will naturally expect it to be sweet, as all vanilla products are. A footnote can be added that Unflavoured and Un sweetened Huel is also available for those who do not like sweet things.
My point is entirely related to market and getting new Huelers hooked. If the initial sample is made ‘not sweet’ to please those on this forum that prefer ‘non sweet’, then my worry was that it might be a little more difficult to get many more newcommers Hueling.
Version 1.0 of Huel was much sweeter. I liked it, but I found I got tired of the taste of it much quicker than I do now. I would be struggling with it by the end of the day. 100% Huel days were really a struggle.
It is the problem with anything that has a strong flavour, you like it at first but then you easily get sick of it. The way it is now is perfect. It’s sweet enough to be pleasant to drink, but not so sweet I get sick of it. But if I want something sweeter on any particular occasion, I can add one of the flavour packs.
What they need to do is release a vanilla flavour pack for those who really like sweet vanilla flavour. Problem solved once and for all. In the meantime, MyProtein do a range of flavour bottles that are simply made from flavouring and sucralose: